Free War Baby by Colin Falconer

hack.’
    ‘You have a talent,’ she said. ‘You take photographs. Damned good ones.’
    ‘No, I have a good camera, that doesn’t make me a good photographer. But I don’t need talent when I have Vietnam. I just have to stay alive to be good at what I do.’
    She shook her head. ‘Sorry, but it’s hard to think of the things I see every day as stepping stones to a career. Was going back for the wounded lieutenant part of the game plan?’
    ‘Like I said, you shamed me into it. Anyway, I thought we agreed we weren’t going to talk shop.’
    ‘One last question. Do you enjoy it?’
    ‘Not really. They said I would but, no, I just got used to it.’
    ‘I guess that’s a good thing.’
    ‘Is it? I have no idea.’ He finished playing with his steak and pushed the plate away. ‘Do you think I’m a ghoul?’
    ‘I don’t know you well enough.’
    ‘Sometimes I think so. When you’re taking photographs of … well, I know some of the grunts think that. There was this time, I was on a medevac and this Marine lieutenant was lying there, holding a compress on some other guy’s chest wound, and there was blood in his hair, it was caked in his ears, he had one eye bandaged up, and he leaned forward and tapped me on the shoulder. Know what he said? Could I take a photograph of him so he could send it to his wife.’ He fidgeted with his glass. ‘We weren’t going to talk about this.’
    ‘My fault, I guess.’ She gave up on her lunch as well. She stared at him, her head cocked to one side. ‘So look, you say you have no talent, but I figure everyone’s good at something. Is there anything you think you can surprise me with?’
     
    * * *
     
    The room was steamy hot, a slow fan on the ceiling hardly stirred the air. A pale gekko darted along the wall. Mickey pushed back the tangled sheet, raised her arms above her head, let the sweat cool on her body, her heart hammering in her chest. After a while she sat up and knelt astride his thighs. She leaned forward so that her hair grazed his face. His eyes blinked open and he smiled at her.
    ‘You see. Youo were wrong.’
    ‘About what?’
    ‘You have an enormous talent,’ she said. ‘Absolutely enormous.’
     
    * * *
     
    ‘I want to see Soeur Odile ,’ Ryan said.
    ‘ C'est impossible ,’ the old nun said. ‘ Au revoir, monsieur. ’ She shook her head and tried to close the heavy wooden door, but Ryan kept his foot there.
    ‘Please.’
    ‘Allez-y!’ Soeur Marie said, peering through the crack.
    Ryan put his weight against the door and gently forced it open. Soeur Marie squealed in alarm. Ryan squeezed inside.
    ‘Quel scandale! Vous êtes fou! ’
    ‘Calm down. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I just need to speak Odile.’
    A man’s voice had never before disturbed the crystal sanctity of the chapel. Every face turned to stare at the intruder. Ryan strode in, Soeur Marie at his heels like a fussing hen. He stopped just inside the door and looked straight at her.
    There was no need for words. It seemed to Odile in that moment that the decision had been taken from her. He raised his hands in a helpless gesture as if to say: I can’t help this and neither can you.
    The canonesse rose from her knees to confront him. Ryan backed slowly out of the chapel. Odile felt her cheeks burning with shame. But there was something else, too, something she had not felt since she was a child.
    Joy.

Chapter 8
     
    Mickey heard doors banging in the hooch. In the distance, through the receding mist of her dreams, she heard the distant whump-whump-whump of the medevac rotors. She tried to focus on the green dial of her watch.
    Someone hammered a fist on her door and threw it open. ‘‘Come on, kiddo, mas-cal!’ The light hurt her eyes. She rolled out of her cot and fumbled for her fatigues.
    She stumbled out of the hooch, her boot laces dragging on the ground. The first Hueys were settling on the landing pads. The roar was deafening; dirt and grit picked up by the